Online learning has been rapidly expanding and offers knowledge to motivated individuals from around the world.
As a DC, you can continue to build your knowledge in a variety of categories with online learning programs such as business, marketing, accounting, website design, etc. Recently Linkedin, the social network for working professionals, bought online learning site Lynda and added over 9000 courses through their newest platform, Linkedin Learning. You can search courses by interests or skills you’d like to acquire and seamlessly add them to your Linkedin profile. You can use these courses to train your staff and track their progress as well. Linkedin Learning costs $25 a month or you can get the same access with a $30 premium subscription.
If you’re like myself and not ready to sign up just yet, here are a few websites that offer free courses you might be interested in.
Content creators
There are three main categories of where to find free online courses. The first are content creators. Sites such as Coursera and EdX offer classes developed by college professors and experts in the field in a wide variety of subjects. These classes are modified from the classroom to the computer screen and goes over example problems step by step. Each of these sites offers between 20-40 healthcare related courses and have class forums for any additional questions.
Content collectors
The next category is content collectors. These sites aggregate new and archived classes from multiple universities around the world. These sites have an incredibly large selection in dozens of languages, but many courses don’t have video, practice questions, or people to answer questions. You can, however, search for more specific graduate level classes and look up the recommended reading materials.
- The Open University
- Open Education Consortium
- Merlot Multimedia: Educational resource for learning and online teaching
- Class Central
University classes
The last category are universities themselves. Many universities make their course sideshows, notes, and sometimes lecture videos available to the public. While many of these courses can be found through the sites listed above, you can sometimes find more materials like slideshow PDFs and other documents by going directly to the source as well.
Randy Thompson, DC, is a 2016 graduate of New York Chiropractic College. Thompson enjoys the challenge of effectively communicating research for practical use and turning satisfied patients into passionate advocates. Follow him on Facebook at facebook.com/RandyThompsonDC.
